With age, many men become merely the shadows of what they once were in their youth, choosing to capitulate to old age’s rape of their mind and body. He has, time and again, risen like the Phoenix from the ashes only to appear with such strength and fortitude that a handful of adolescents would be put to shame. He is my grandfather, he is my friend, he is, like the Phoenix, a mystery to me.

My grandfather, J.R. Cash, lived through the Great Depression, World War II, the Korean War, Vietnam, Sonny and Cher, and Senator Joseph McCarthy to name a few. He has known times of deep trouble and times of great joy, the former far outweighing the latter. His face reflects all he has seen. The times of trouble are evident in the deep pores of his face – it is a rough face, one fit to light a match on. One of the most dramatic features found on his commanding physiognomy is the deep, unique, and somewhat mystical scar on his right cheek. He would tell you that he got it battling a scalawag in a bar fight, or some other dramatic scene; in actuality, he made the mistake of letting a drunken dentist remove a cyst from his jawbone. I’d tell the bar story too. His eyebrows are greyed and bushy, and rest above his big, brown eyes. The Cash nose; it’s large, pronounced, and round – and never fails to pass from generation to generation; he has it, his children have it, and most of his grandchildren, including myself, have it – it is the piéce de resistance which completes the portrait of a typical Cash. Finally, the voice - his most unique feature. He has a deep, baritone voice which no one could mistake to be that of anyone else. I spent the night at his home four years ago and, at about 5 o’clock in the morning, I heard him bellow “Dustin, time to get up son.” Needless to say, despite the consuming feeling of utter fatigue, I rose with haste – the voice demands authority and receives it without fail.

My grandfather’s personal life is checkered with public successes and personal failures. He officially began his music career in 1955 and, when the schedule became too demanding, ironically resorted to the use of drugs to maintain a grip on his reality. This was both a personal and public failure – he was arrested in El Paso for attempting to “smuggle prescription drugs across the border” and the press knew it – and through the help of his family and his own spirituality, he rose from the ashes and went on to outsell the Beatles and land more pop hits on the charts than Michael Jackson. In 1989, when he died on the operating table during open-heart surgery, he miraculously pulled through the operation and lived to tell his family that he spited the doctors for bringing him back from the white light. When he was recently diagnosed with Shy Drager Disease, a debilitating disorder affecting the nervous system, he didn’t shrivel up and let his illness consume him. To quote him, “I refuse to give it some ground in my life.” However, this diagnosis turned out to be an error and he is actually conflicted with a diabetic disorder – a disease which I also inherited from him. Now, did I mention that he’s stubborn? He’s 69 years old and, until recently, he ate as many candy bars a day as he wanted, he put 5 spoons of sugar in his coffee, and he ate mammoth bowls of Breyer’s ice-cream. But, he doesn’t let his old age and his maladies immobilize him – he goes to Jamaica at least three times a year and he travels whenever necessary; if asked to visit an out of state friend, his reply will never be “I can’t come, my arthritis is acting up.”

But, while my grandfather is both great in soul and great in life experience, he is also shrouded in mystery to me. I didn’t know my grandfather very well until recently. He was always touring and traveling until he officially retired in 1996. This lack of a relationship has cast him as a half-man, half-mythical figure. I never knew he liked Roman history as I did until I told him I was in Latin class. After I told him about my taking Latin, he took me to the office in his bedroom and gave me a book written by Josephus. Since he has retired, I have grown to know Grandpa John more as a grandfather and less as an American icon, which is how I viewed him when I was 10 years old and younger. Rude, ignorant people ask me all the time, “What does your grandpa give you for Christmas? He’s rich isn’t he?”

Out of everything he’s ever given me, the greatest gift is the newly established relationship which I will cherish long after he is gone; the American icon persona will fade – people will forget Johnny Cash – I will never forget my Grandpa John.